Deer Park brings home consolation championship

Published 6:00 pm, Tuesday, December 30, 2003

All-Tournament selection Ryan Bright led a trio of Deer Park players in double figures as the Deer captured the consolation championship to the 17th annual Alvin Holiday Basketball Tournament with a 70-63 win over Baytown Lee at Alvin Community College.

Bright scored a team-high 16 points, J.T. Fletcher tacked on 14 and Josue Sanabria dropped in 12 as suddenly red-hot Deer Park brought home its first plaque from the tournament in years.

The win was Deer Park's fourth straight and it ended the team's non-district play. The club will take an 11-7 record into district.

Deer Park took a commanding 53-39 lead into the fourth period, but Lee, behind the strength of four 3-point goals, got the deficit down to 64-61, following an 8-0 tear.

By ROBERT AVERY

But Fletcher's biggest bucket of the night, a lay-up off a sidelines inbounds play plus two Diego Jaramillo free throws with 39 seconds remaining got the lead back to five.

Of Fletcher's scoring total, nine came in the fourth period.

The final frantic seconds saw Lee miss its last six shot attempts from the floor, including two putback tries.

Lee earned its meeting with Deer Park by beating Madison Tuesday morning in the semifinals 108-98, the highest-scoring game of the tourney.

In every game of the tournament for Deer Park, the club responded well to each opponent's charge.

"We made some progress there as far as handling those type situations late in the game," Carlisle said. "This had to help."

"We passed real well and played as a team," Bright said.

A 34-26 Deer Park halftime lead was immediately inflated higher during the opening seconds of the third period. Nathan Walkup drained back-to-back treys and Brian Duke sank a third one, pushing the advantage to 45-30.

Carlisle also felt the championship was due to some fresher legs on the court, courtesy of the veteran coach using his entire bench.